The National Quality Forum announced it has approved 14 palliative and end-of-life care measures covering areas such as patient and family experience, pain management and shortness of breath.

An NQF panel had considered 22 such measures, ultimately endorsing the final list of 14, according to a news release.

“These palliative and end-of-life care measures are a welcome addition to the NQF portfolio,” June Lunney, director of research at the Hospice and Palliative Nurses Association and co-chair of NQF's Palliative Care and End-of-Life Care Endorsement Maintenance Steering Committee, said in the release. “As the number of palliative and end-of-life care programs continue to grow across the country, it's critical that providers have the right measurement tools to help ensure patients receive safe, high-quality and compassionate care.”

The newly endorsed measures will improve patient satisfaction, ease provider-patient communication and reduce emergency admissions, R. Sean Morrison, director of the National Palliative Care Research Center and co-chair of NQF's steering committee, said in the release.

The list includes measures from a number of sources, including the RAND Corp., the National Hospice and Palliative Care Organization, and Deyta, a provider of healthcare quality measurement tools and benchmarks.